Agile Techniques for Better Software Engineering, regardless of the consequences.

Saturday, June 10, 2006

Effecting Change

Things seem to be working wellThat's easy for you to say, but you're stuck in a microcosm, doing your things your way. How do you know that you're not a local optimum? You might be simply burdening everyone else with your inadequacy. You must change.

How should we know what to do?There's a method that goes like this:

I tell you that what you are doing is wrong.

You are frightened to confront the problem and so run away.

You are caught out by me and made, like a biblical prophet, to undergo a voyage of discovery, mainly involving sitting in the putrid innards of a huge sea creature.

Now frightened to have an opinion of your own, lest more punishment occurs, you agree to do what you're told.

You leave the whale and preach the new edicts as you were told to.

The people of Nineveh agree to your demands, equally fearful of punishment, regardless of whether living "in sin" wasn't just subjective.

Everything changes.

Unsuprisingly, this is called the Jonah method of teaching. It's very effective.

What if I can't change?Well, if your organisation is changing and you can't change then perhaps you should get out. Change your organisation, as it were.

If the kitchen is too hot, then get out of it. Don't become a muda.

What if change is wrong?Don't be stupid. Change is never wrong. What a foolish question to ask. But, to placate yourself for a bit, why not give change a try in the false belief that if it doesn't work, or doesn't offer any significant improvement over the way things used to be, you would be able to reverse it.

The more things are changing, the less you need to worry about whether they're right. They will never settle long enough for people to notice and you can always attribute anything that's not working to the process of change. Brilliant!